I've featured a couple of Pietsch iris during the past few weeks on my blog.
Our yard has been ablaze with their beauty---white and purple, rust brown, pure white, deep purple, solid yellow.
I don't know if this is an especially good iris year, but our blooms have been exquisite.
I dedicate the one above to Carol Pietsch, who died two days ago.
Carol was my colleague, a fellow 4-H leader, and longtime family friend.
Carol taught home economics and other related classes at Sandpoint High School for years.
We faculty members always ate our lunch in her home-ec room.
Carol also helped me sew a complete dress in record time, considering the 4-H model and its accessories that Eleanor Delamarter spent several painful months guiding me along troubled seams.
Carol insisted that it might be easier now that I was an adult, and she was right. I think the dress was one we made for me to wear while chaperoning a senior prom. Anyway, together, we completed it, and I wore it to the prom in a week's time.
I don't know where that dress is----most are tucked away somewhere with no plans for ever being worn again.
Anyway, Carol and her devoted husband Gary and their three children Chris, Jaye and Wes have played a role in many, many aspects of our lives---especially our "Love" life. After all, as publisher of the Sandpoint News Bulletin, Gary sent me on the assignment to go cover the Farragut Boy Scout Jamboree where I met Bill in 1973.
Chris, now an award-winning photographer who literally got his feet wet mopping the SHS darkroom floor, chronicled our wedding week with his camera. He and Don Dundon, the Sandpoint News Bulletin photographer, captured the wedding itself 35 years ago this week.
I lost many of the photos when our house burned down in 1984, and both saw to it that I had some replacements.
Carol was quite a photographer too; it was a family trait among the Pietsches. Carol used to snap photos of the area, and Selkirk Press, which they owned at the time, would feature them on its annual calendar.
Over the past several years, Carol's health has not been so good, and everyone who knows the Pietsches has witnessed absolute devotion on the part of her wonderful, warm-hearted husband Gary.
They celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary a few years ago at the Oden Grange Hall---and what a phenomenal, heartfelt photo show Chris put on for them there!
In these past years, a common uniter of this couple who have been in love forever, it seems, was that Iris garden on the hillside overlooking Sand Creek, where they've lived for a long time.
Often, while driving to and from town, I'd see them out there working with all the beautiful flowers that Carol had collected from early childhood gardens, etc. I'm told they shared the beauty of that garden right up until Carol's passing.
When we moved to the Lovestead three years ago, the Pietsches called and said they wanted to come out and give us some starts.
I remember the pleasant summer afternoon here on our deck as we visited and laughed---humor always was and will always will be a staple among the Pietsches. They loved to laugh at themselves and at the crazy moments of life.
Well, when they left, a sack of Iris starts remained for me to place in the ground. This year those plants have outdone themselves, bringing us great joy and awe.
And, I'd like to think that Carol did the same wherever she went when her health was good. She touched so many people as a teacher, friend, even a politician for a time.
She has left behind a wonderful family, some treasured memories and all those iris which will remind us 'til our dying day of a good friend who created more than her share of perennial beauty for this world to enjoy.
In these past years, a common uniter of this couple who have been in love forever, it seems, was that Iris garden on the hillside overlooking Sand Creek, where they've lived for a long time.
Often, while driving to and from town, I'd see them out there working with all the beautiful flowers that Carol had collected from early childhood gardens, etc. I'm told they shared the beauty of that garden right up until Carol's passing.
When we moved to the Lovestead three years ago, the Pietsches called and said they wanted to come out and give us some starts.
I remember the pleasant summer afternoon here on our deck as we visited and laughed---humor always was and will always will be a staple among the Pietsches. They loved to laugh at themselves and at the crazy moments of life.
Well, when they left, a sack of Iris starts remained for me to place in the ground. This year those plants have outdone themselves, bringing us great joy and awe.
And, I'd like to think that Carol did the same wherever she went when her health was good. She touched so many people as a teacher, friend, even a politician for a time.
She has left behind a wonderful family, some treasured memories and all those iris which will remind us 'til our dying day of a good friend who created more than her share of perennial beauty for this world to enjoy.
3 comments:
this town of ours has lost a lot of fine people this past month..
Thank you so much for the kind words Marianne. For anyone interested, I have posted a few images on my family blog at http://pietschbrubaker.blogspot.com/
Chris
I wore Carols wedding dress! We had bought all the material for mine and she said, "You just need to try mine on!" It fit like a glove and I felt like a princess wearing it.
That was over 30 years ago.
Carol was my favorite high school teacher in 1973-75. More than that, she and Gary are forever friends.
I am so thankful to have shared a bit of their family and lives. I am saddened by her death, but know she is free and walking among her flowers forever.
Sincerely, Sue Cove-Colorado
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